Mazi Colman Obasi, OGSPAN President at the launching of PETROHUB
…The innovation is to proffer solutions to the downstream sector of Nigeria’s oil industry
…To provide industry-wide oil and gas Marketplace where stakeholders in the value chain can interact and trade
…To unlock potentials of new technologies such as artificial intelligence
…Products thoroughly vetted before listed for sale to buyers
-By Felix Douglas
PETROHUB is Nigeria’s first online oil and gas new market place with importers, depot owners, marketers, suppliers, fleet owners and end users transact business. It is a concept of the members of Oil and Gas Service Providers Association of Nigeria (OGSPAN).
OGSPAN introduced PETROHUB in Lagos and the event brought together various stakeholders across the value chain including government and financial institutions. It was a private and public participation event to address lingering issues bedeviling the downstream sector.
In his welcome address at the launching of PETROHUB, Mazi Colman Obasi, President of OGSPAN, made it known that the need for an association of service providers and indeed the services providable in the Oil and Gas industry in Nigeria has been agitating the minds of few players in the industry for quite some time.
He said the realization of this dream had been hampered by the discordant tunes and absence of formative will in the industry. Luckily, the jinx was broken on Wednesday, November 29, 2006 at the NIPEX Joint Qualification System (NJQS) Awareness Workshop. The workshop was organized by Nigerian Petroleum Exchange (NipeX), a division of NAPIMS-NNPC and Achilles Information Limited, was held in Lagos. They held the first workshop in Port Harcourt. But the Lagos workshop attracted over 300 service provider companies.
Obasi pointed out that for the first time in the history of Oil and Gas industry in Nigeria, NipeX through the workshops brought together, a majority of service companies (Providers) in Nigeria. During the questions and answers session, the issue of Service Providers (SP) representation in the NJQS Steering Committee was raised by Obasi, CEO of Doubleday Expressions Limited, one of the leading consulting firms in the industry. Mrs. Unoh Adedeji, General Manager of NipeX, responded by saying that SP were free to nominate their representatives into the committee.
He added that this was how OGSPAN started in order to proffer solutions to the downstream segment of the industry.
Obasi noted that PETROHUB is promoted by OGSPAN and it intends to partner with all stakeholders in the industry to provide real-time and industry-wide Oil and Gas Marketplace. OGSPAN introduced this innovation to the Oil and Gas industry in Nigeria.
He stated further that OGSPAN cardinal objective that sparked off the concept of PETROHUB and others is to encourage the harnessing of resources and technical expertise by members and formation of alliances for competitive edge in the oil and gas marketplace.
Going forward, it is to provide a common platform for the Nigerian Oil and Gas industry based SP for the good of members and the value chain of oil resources on the Nigerian economy and the industrialization of the country. Also, to become the nexus for the exchange of ideas and information for the development and promotion of local Nigerian content in the oil and gas industry in Nigeria.
He posited that Petrohub.com.ng is Africa’s/Nigeria’s No 1, Oil and Gas Marketplace with a mission to provide a real-time innovative technology marketplace where oil and gas suppliers, buyers and product owners and transporters interact and trade.
For PETROHUB, according to Obasi, its major objectives are to provide real-time electronic marketplace where depots owners, suppliers and buyers of petroleum products will transact business with minimal human interference. It will make the processes and procedures more efficient by providing live information and data on actual products volume available at the depots, live pricing, truck ordering and scheduling fleet tracking for potential buyers.
PETROHUB will promote the sales of products and services of its clients in a transparent manner. Through the process, it will compete on the rate of learning by leveraging innovation and technology to identify and fulfill each individual customer’s changing needs and by deploying the best human and machines to unlock the full potentials of new technologies such as artificial intelligence and the collaborative ecosystems in the Oil and Gas industry in Nigeria.
The new innovation will consciously create both social and economic values to shape critical social issues that will increasingly and continuously improve business sustainability in environment and ecosystem. Another objective of PETROHUB is that it will embrace new ideas and open communication practices and commitment to building diversity at organizational level to achieve innovation, resilience and unlock full potentials of diversity in the organization.
A significant aspect of PETROHUB is its vetting process. All product owners on its platform are thoroughly vetted before their products are listed for sale to buyers.
The innovative idea automates payment of all accrued service charges to stakeholders. Its team facilitates fast loading of any product(s) purchased through its platform
PETROHUB protects product theft. In cases of product theft and under-delivery, the buyer is refunded from the transporters’ fund. Erring transporters are sanctioned.
The OGSPAN President noted that the new initiative facilitates truck hiring, ordering and scheduling from different locations around the country.
Obasi disclosed that there may not be any other country in the world that has the type of challenges Nigeria has but with “PETROHUB coming into play, you may soon walk into any petroleum products depots you only see trucks strolling in to load without people milling around.”
He opined that members of OGSPAN are a group of oil and gas professionals with vast experiences, knowledge and skills in the industry who have embraced the culture of innovation and technology towards transforming the industry and by extension improving the nation’s economy.
According to him OGSPAN – PETROHUB is entirely a Nigerian concept to deal with the country’s needs. He urged operators to support and patronize the initiative.
The OGSPAN helmsman enjoined operators in the industry to partner and collaborate with the professional association to transform the oil and gas sector and move the industry including the country’s economy forward.
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